Chamomile Tea May Not Be Safe During Pregnancy

For the same reason aspirin should be avoided in pregnancy, chamomile has such powerful anti-inflammatory properties that regular consumption may result in a serious fetal heart problem—premature constriction of the fetal ductus arteriosus, which allows the fetus to “breathe” in the womb.

Chamomile is one of the oldest widely used medicinal plants in the world. A recent review suggests there is scientific evidence supporting its use against inflammation, cancer, the common cold, heart disease, diarrhea, eczema, ulcers, hemorrhoids, mouth ulcers, osteoporosis, insomnia, anxiety, diabetes, sore throat, vaginitis, wounds, and the kitchen sink. “Safety in young children, pregnant or nursing women, or those with liver or kidney disease has not been established, although there have not been any credible reports of toxicity caused by this common tea beverage.” Well, now there is.

See, chamomile is a powerful anti-inflamamtory agent, and that’s the problem. There’s a reason pregnant women are not supposed to take anti-inflammatory drugs, like aspirin. “Premature constriction of the fetal ductus arteriosus following the maternal consumption of camomile herbal tea.”

The researchers observed two cases of premature ductal closure associated with maternal consumption of chamomile tea, which can be associated with serious fetal complications. The good news; if it’s caught early, and the herbal tea is stopped, the condition can be reversed. In the second case, though, they had to do an emergency Caesarean.

Chamomile is one of the oldest widely used medicinal plants in the world. A recent review suggests there is scientific evidence supporting its use against inflammation, cancer, the common cold, heart disease, diarrhea, eczema, ulcers, hemorrhoids, mouth ulcers, osteoporosis, insomnia, anxiety, diabetes, sore throat, vaginitis, wounds, and the kitchen sink. “Safety in young children, pregnant or nursing women, or those with liver or kidney disease has not been established, although there have not been any credible reports of toxicity caused by this common tea beverage.” Well, now there is.

See, chamomile is a powerful anti-inflamamtory agent, and that’s the problem. There’s a reason pregnant women are not supposed to take anti-inflammatory drugs, like aspirin. “Premature constriction of the fetal ductus arteriosus following the maternal consumption of camomile herbal tea.”

The researchers observed two cases of premature ductal closure associated with maternal consumption of chamomile tea, which can be associated with serious fetal complications. The good news; if it’s caught early, and the herbal tea is stopped, the condition can be reversed. In the second case, though, they had to do an emergency Caesarean.

29 responses to “Chamomile Tea May Not Be Safe During Pregnancy”

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WOW!!!!!!
That is crazy!! I would never have known. I am Board Certified in Echocardiography and have been doing it for over 20 years and I never heard of this before.
Extremely interesting!
I wonder if the same would be true for all antioxidant tea–Hibiscus Tea?

Chamomile Tea has no caffeine. It’s the caffeine that is the problem.Camelia sinensis has caffeine and is black tea or green tea. Chamomile is a vital, calming, soothing tea, safe at all times. The article is incorrect.

I remember as a kid we used to drink sassafras tea occasionally. I believe it was also the flavoring for candy cigarettes. Now you can’t get sassafras root anywhere. Anyone know why? I assume they found something bad enough to ban it, but what?

I was intrigued as well by your question. Went to wikipedia plus pub med. Indeed there are alkaloids in sassafras that led to its banning due to carcinogenic and liver damage. Some products have become available if they receive the proper treatment. I would avoid as there are better alternatives and I don’t recommend consuming products that have had toxins removed as no process is 100%.

ERROR REPORT: Chamomile (Matricaria Chamomilla) is NOT the herb referred to in the letter to the editor by Sridharan (in sources above and referred to in the video). The plant that caused pregnancy problems is well-known to be contraindicated in pregnancy. In the article it is identified as “camomile tea (Camellia sinensis) root extract.” Camellia sinensis is not only the plant that furnishes leaves for green and black tea, but they used the ROOT extract of camellia sinensis. The authors of the letter are incorrect in calling this plant “camomile.”

I have been studying phytomedicine for over 35 years. This video quotes a letter to the editor which has erroneous information about chamomile tea. Your video is confusing camellia sinensis with chamomile. Although they sound similar, they are definitely different plants. Chamomile is a gentle, white flower with gentle leaves. Chamomile tea is safe. It is even used for babies who have colic. Camellia, on the other hand, is a caffeinated tea leaf. Black tea, green tea are made from camellia sinensis. I have never heard of using a root extract of camellia. Only the leaves are used for tea. Anyone who created
or used the root extract is getting too strong of a dose of
caffeinated black tea with other root alkaloids. No wonder it was so
harsh and damaging. Be assured that chamomile is a wonderful and safe tea.
Dr. Gregor, thank you for your videos. We watch them daily. They are educational and entertaining. However, perhaps you would do well to remain within the food and medicine field until you have a mastery of phtyomedicine. You are doing a disservice to great knowledge and to the public when you present erroneous information such as this. For accurate information on chamomile, refer to King’s Dispensatory, by Felter-Lloyd or Herbal Medicine by Rudolph Weiss, MD. Many people watch your movies and rely on your research. I, for one, am beginning to have my doubts. Please research more carefully before blasting away a great, safe product of nature like chamomile tea. Thank you.

I’m so glad you’ve found my work useful! The authors of the letter did indeed get the latin name wrong. Chamomile is Matricaria chamomilla (though I think in Europe it’s Chamomilla chamomilla), which is what the women reported drinking. I agree with you chamomile is wonderful, but apparently a bit too anti-inflammatory to be used during pregnancy.

I think many medical professionals in Europe, especially Switzerland, would vehemently disagree that chamomile tea during pregnancy and postpartum could be dangerous in any capacity.
When I gave birth in Switzerland, not only did they give mothers and mothers to be chamomile tea but also newborns in between breast feedings. It was even mandatory to wash our lady parts with warm chamomile tea 3 times a day. I must add that my eldest son has never had any health issues.

Please post a retraction to this video. Chamomile is safe. I heard back from the author of the letter that you referred to in the video. He clearly states that the herb that caused problems in pregnancy was camellia sinensis, not chamomile. There are many confusing common names, or nicknames, to herbs. It is best to use the botanical name to verify the herb used, rather than a misspelled common name. I quote,
“Regarding the article about camomile tea during pregnancy (Ultrasound Obstet Gynecol 2009; 34: 358–360)-
We were referring to Camellia Sinesis. The studies were performed with
the infusion of the leaves. This is the commonest preparation
commercially available in the UK (Twinings).
Kind regards
Shankar Sridharan
Dr Shankar Sridharan
Consultant Paediatric Cardiologist”

Thank you for sharing your correspondence eicosatetraenoic,
but you failed to disclose what you actually asked. You didn’t ask him
about the herb that caused problems in pregnancy, you asked about the
pharmacological studies on Camellia sinensis (the ones Dr. Sridharan
mentioned were performed on rats). The studies on humans he cites was
done on actual chamomile (Wang Y, Tang H, Nicholson JK, Hylands PJ, Sampson J, Holmes E. A metabonomic strategy for the detection of the
metabolic effects of Chamomile tea (Matricaria recutita L.) ingestion. J Agric Food Chem 2005; 53: 191–196). The question is what were the affected women in the case series were drinking, and Dr. Sridharan wrote that they reported to be drinking chamomile.

Thank you for sharing your correspondence eicosatetraenoic,
but you failed to disclose what you actually asked. You didn’t ask him
about the herb that caused problems in pregnancy, you asked about the
pharmacological studies on Camellia sinensis (the ones Dr. Sridharan
mentioned were performed on rats). The studies on humans he cites was
done on actual chamomile (Wang Y, Tang H, Nicholson JK, Hylands PJ, Sampson J,
Holmes E. A metabonomic strategy for the detection of the
metabolic effects of Chamomile tea (Matricaria recutita L.) ingestion. J Agric Food Chem 2005; 53: 191–196). The question is what were the affected women in the case series were drinking, and Dr. Sridharan wrote that they reported to be drinking chamomile.

Dr. Sridharan in his case reports mentions that both patients reported drinking chamomile tea but he quotes two studies one about tea (camellia sinensis root extract) and another about the prolonged duration of chamomile metabolic effects after ingestion. He jumps from camellia sinensis to chamomile interchangeably (hence the confusion), which clearly they are not. The tea root extract paper by Chattopadhyay et. al ascribes the effect to the saponins present in the root and not the caffeine whereas the chamomile study by Bhaskaran et al shows the anti-inflammatory effect of chamomile is by inhibition of Nitric oxide synthase which is also confusing because nitric oxide is known to relax the blood vessels and not constrict them, but it is possible to have two different effects of the same depending on the receptor in question (one causes constriction and the other dilatation).

How would an anti-inflammatory cause premature constriction of the fetal ductus arteriosus? My daughter has a serious heart defect that almost caused her to need a shunt after birth to replace the fetal ductus arteriosus and I drank chamomile tea, while not every day, on a regular basis during my pregnancy and she ended up not needing the shunt even though they told us she would. I realize this is anecdotal and not scientific but still it seems both counter intuitive and makes no sense with my own experience.

“We have observed two cases
of premature ductal constriction associated with the
maternal consumption of camomile tea (made from the
leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant). There was no history
of NSAID use in either patient.”

and

“Pharmacological studies of camomile tea (Camellia
sinensis) root extract have shown it to possess anti-
inflammatory activity at 1/10th of its median lethal dose in
rodents.”

i followed up on the study and they were indeed referring to the same plant both times (Camellia sinensis and not actual chamomile tea.) i have no proof that chamomile tea (Matricaria Chamomilla) is not harmful, only that this study has no bearing on the health effects of this plant

Just a personal testimony here after I saw this video. I had a sprain lately that was quite inflamed, gave me intense pain at night, to the point of having to bite into something and then being forced to take a painkiller. Wasn’t too happy with that so I thought I’d try chamomile since it is a natural anti-inflamatory. While an ibuprofen pill (200mg) took about 30 minutes to clear the pain away, chamomile in a tea form took less than 15 minuts, not all the pain was gone but 95% of it which was way enough to fall asleep.
The chamomile species is unknown (we foraged a variety of different mixed species) and the dose was 50 flowers for 1~2L (probably too much, I’ll dilute in the future but hope I’ll never need it again :) ).
Some readers will legitimately say “It could have been the placebo effect”. Yes, it could have. But to assess that, I also tried other techniques like breathing and meditation which worked but chamomille cleared within 15 minuts a very intense pain (faster), hence I am biased but drawn from experience to suspect there was a placebo effect, as well as more to it at than just placebo. I also had more faith in ibuprofene working than in my chamomile experiment doing anything.

Michael Greger I read your article on chamomile tea and it gave me some thing to think about my little boy was born with breath holding spells and I drank chamomile tea right threw my pregnancy could that have caused it?

This is embarrassing, you obviously mix up two herbs in this video. Two plant species with similar names. The worst is, that you show the picture of a harmless herb in the beginning. As others have already mentioned here: It’s not the commonly used herb, that creates problems in pregnancy, it’s the green tea with a similar name which does cause harm. Please read the papers you discuss thoroughly before you publish incorrect statements. This is unbelievable! Delete this video!

Interesting information. I have studied and experimented with the effectiveness and side effects of multiple herbs for several years, and I would not let my pregnant daughter drink chamomile tea. I err on the side of caution. I have used chamomile successfully to treat pink eye, as a very mild anti-inflammatory, pre menstrual aid, and as a skin treatment. Since there is information that chamomile may bring on menstruation, and since I have used it for such purposes, I would not say it is completely safe during pregnancy. On caffeine: I suspect that it has been overly demonised. I bore 4 healthy children, and I never once cut back on my caffeinated drinks. Just because I had a non detrimental experience does not mean similar experiences are guaranteed for everyone. Every body is different, especially pregnant bodies!